Going to the very heart of Zen.

September 30, 2013

The "non-self is nirvana" argument by the Theravada (not to be confused with Theravada Buddhism of the Dhammakaya Foundation) asserts that nirvana is anâtman or non-self by the following argument.

Supported by verse 279 from the Dhammapada and a verse from Anguttara-Nikaya verse (A. i. 286), which are identical, Theravada claim that because both verses read, “All phenomena (dhammâ) are non-self (P., anattâ; S., anâtman),” and since nirvana is a dhamma, it stands to reason that nirvana must be non-self. But this fallacy, which is precisely what it is, doesn't hold water. Exposing this deception for what it is, the commentary to verse 279 of the Dhammapada states, unambiguously, that “All dhammas: sabbe dhammâ" only refers to the Five Aggregates (Carter & Palihawadana, The Dhammapada, p. 312). These aggregates are never other than dependently arisen and conditioned.

Elsewhere in another discourse the Buddha makes a distinction between dhammas conditioned or unconditioned (sankhatâ vâ sankhatâ) at A. ii. 34. There is no lumping up of constructed with unconstructed dhammas in this pericope. They are separate. In addition, Udana (28) speaks of a monk as “knowing nibbana of the self” (jaññâ nibbânam attano)—not of the non-self. The commentary (UdA, 191) does not lend any support to the claim that attano is used in a conventional sense or as a pronoun.

The most important point of all, is the Buddha tells his monks that “you should abandon desire for whatever is anattâ (SN 22:68). If the Theravadin choose to believe that somehow anattâ is nirvana, how can their belief be consistent with what the Buddha said—are the monks supposed to also abandon nirvana? Another problem, regarding the expression, all dhammas, the Buddha says:

September 29, 2013

Is the âtman (P., attâ) to be viewed like an affliction? A few Buddhist sects believe it is. But if we make an in-depth reading of the Pali suttapitaka, and its parallel the Agamas does the âtman still turn out to be an affliction? The firm and unyielding answer is, no.

Ironically, the opposite turns out to be true. Anâtaman (P., anattâ) certainly has the marks of being an affliction. What is anâtman or "not the self" is at the root of misery—not the âtman. In fact, the Buddha never once tells his monks to reject the âtman. On the contrary, he says to his monks: "Bhikkhus, you should abandon desire for whatever does not belong to self (anattaniya)" (S. iii. 78). In another place he tells his monks: “Bhikkhus, you should abandon desire for whatever is nonself (anattâ)" (S. iii. 178).

“The quote- So, when Buddhists claim that there is no Âtman, they are not really saying that it does not exist, but that it exists solely as an affliction - an innate response to the world around us; and this deeply enmeshed affliction lies at the root of all misery Is one that is contrary to anatta doctrine. They really are saying no self exists, the point the causes ignorance is the conception that it does. it doesn't exist, but the idea of it does. It is this which brings about suffering. The beginning of this passage of the article should be changed to be more in line with the suttas in it's reflection of anatta. Ref- MN 22, SN 22.1, SN 44.10, AN 7.46, AN 10.60”

Does the Buddha ever tell his devoted followers the âtman is anything close to a affliction? No he doesn’t. Howver, we learn, among other things, that the psychophysical body has forty negative characteristics, one of them being anâtman. This same body is also murderous and belongs to Mara the Buddhist devil.

Now, shouldn’t we be scratching our heads and wondering why some Buddhists see âtman as the bad guy? Are they crazy, bonkers, just plain evil, or just simpletons whose reading skills are not what they should be?

September 26, 2013

If the Buddha, as a staunch self-denier, were to have actually argued with a sage who claimed to have awakened to the âtman, the Buddha probably would have lost.

That there exists a debate going on in Buddhism between Buddhists who claim that the Buddha was never a self-denier and those who claim otherwise, largely depends on how one chooses to interpret statements made by the Buddha. In other words, it is a special kind of debate that were it to take place outside the discourses of Buddhism, would be considerably different.

First, permit me first to show a passage that two Buddhists on the opposite side of the fence might disagree with.

Is this passage from a self-denying Buddha? Or is this from a Buddha who upholds the self or âtman? What we do know is that this passage might be debated upon until the cows come home.

Here I have conceived how an exchange might go if a self-denying Buddha had encountered a sage who had realized the âtman. By no means is this exchange perfect but I hope it illustrates that the Buddha would have had a difficult time as a self-denier with someone like Shankara, for example, who was the main representative of Advaita-Vedanta.

Sage: Good Gautama, is it true that you teach there is no âtman beyond the pale of the psychophysical body; that with the body’s demise, the âtman is also no more?

Self-denying Buddha: Yes, it is true sage that I teach this. As I look into the this psychophysical body I see nothing resembling your âtman. In physical shape there is only physical shape, in feeling only feeling, in perception only perception, in volition only volition and in consciousness only consciousness.

Sage: Good Gautama, I have realized differently. The âtman is not physical shape, feeling, perception, volition or consciousness. When these constituents arise the âtman is unaffected by their arising; when they are no more, the âtman remains unaffected by their absence. Using an analogy, if a potter makes a beautiful clay pot, the clay is not affected by being made into a beautiful pot. If this same clay pot were to break, losing its shape and beauty, the clay would remain unaffected by the breaking of the pot. So also is the âtman like this. When the psychophysical body arises and eventually expires, the âtman remains unchanged.

Self-denying Buddha: Good Sage, when I look for this âtman of yours by way of my psychophysical body, I cannot find it. Therefore it does not exist. It is an illusion which you have reified.

Sage: Good Gautama, the psychophysical body is only a manifestation of the âtman like a pot is a manifestation of clay or rope is a manifestation of valvaja grass. In dependence upon clay does the pot arise; the same with rope that depends upon valvaja grass. The âtman is never manifest as you believe it is, which is why you cannot behold it. When one completely stops cling to these various manifestations, only then do they merge with the âtman which is my Nirvana. Earlier you said that in physical shape there is only physical shape, in feeling only feeling, in perception only perception, in volition only volition and in consciousness only consciousness. This makes no sense. Now let me ask you: From what do these constituents arise?

Self-denying Buddha: They are an illusion. They don’t exist. In physical shape there is no physical shape, in feeling there is no feeling, in perception there is no perception, in volition there is no volition and in consciousness there is no consciousness.

Sage: Good Gautama you have contradicted yourself. Next, let me ask you, when there is no physical shape, no feeling, no perception, no volition and no consciousness, what remains?

Self-denying Buddha: There is the Void which is absence.

Sage: But from what did physical shape, feeling, perception, volition and consciousness arise from? Surely not from this Void which is absence. So far you have taken an annihilationist position only addressing the destruction of these constituents or what you call the Void. Now tell me, from what did these constituents arise?

Self-denying Buddha: They arose from avidya or ignorance.

Sage: Ignorance of what good Gautama?

Self-denying Buddha: Ignorance that these constituents are not arising because there is only the Void or absence.

Sage: As I hear your Dharma, the arising psychophysical constituents do not arise because there is really only the Void or absence. This is annihilationism because it denies that things or constituents arise.

Our self-denying Buddha offers us nothing soteriological, except annihilation disguised in various forms such as anâtman, Voidness, and absence (abhâva). It is not hard to imagine why Buddhism all but disappeared in India only to be replaced by Vedanta which, ironically, owed a great deal to Buddhism (cp. Nakamura, A History of Early Vedanta Philosophy, Part One, p. 131).

September 24, 2013

Is the human mind the sum of the brain’s neural activity? We can better understand what this question intends by asking, “Is what comes out of an iPod the sum of the iPod’s components? The answer is no. The iPod did not write the music it plays. By the same account, the brain’s neural activity is not creating mind. Neuroscientists have no idea what Buddha Mind is.

What, so to speak, goes on in our heads, such as our mental images, internal dialogue, emotions and so forth, are mind generated. Being involved in this process we don’t recognize mind as it really is. We only witness the effects of mind, even though, from a Buddhist standpoint, we are absolute Mind. As ordinary beings (not enlightened beings) all that we are capable of beholding is mind generated effects.

When we have to face a koan, what the creator of the koan is not telling us is that the koan’s participant is going to become ensnared, facing a clever mind generated image (it's a trap!), or a phrase or word such as ‘Mu’ (another trap!). More importantly, what the participant is not being told is that the koan’s answer rests, not upon the mind generated images or words, but on realizing the Mind that generates all this. Only if the koan’s participant manages to discover this Mind will the koan’s intent become clear. Only then will the koan be solved.

The koan is not words of wisdom or some special kind of Buddhist advice. The koan is setting up the participant to look within to uncover the luminous nature of Mind. In the preface to the Zenshu Mumonkan by Mumon he says that “Buddhism makes mind its foundation” ((trans. Blyth). This is an important clue to the koan, itself. We can ponder koans from an intellectual perspective—but part of the real intention of the koan is to exhaust the intellect until we arrive at our wit’s end. Only then are we ripe for the plucking; only then we might get lucky and see Buddhism’s foundation.

If we neglect the investigation of Mind, itself, which is forever immaculate and, instead, follow words and letters which are Mind produced, we will never arrive at the true essence of Zen. Before the image appears in our head, before internal dialogue is spoken, before our pondering of the koan, trying to intellectualize it, according to The Hekigan Roku (The Blue Cliff Records) lies, “The real substance of the Universe, the ‘First Principle.’

One more thing. Almost anything the Zen masters of old did was made into a koan. Even the most simple act of a student who answers the teacher’s summons can be turned into a koan. “What brought you to my quarters?” Here the teacher is making the student look for the real substance of the Universe that animates his body. Unless the student knows the answer he is a goner. If the student can’t give the right answer how can he expect to know the answer to “The eastern mountain sails on the river”?

September 23, 2013

A wise person, the more they dive into Buddhism and explore its territory, the less likely they are to make pronouncements that the Buddha, for example, denied the self, or Buddhism is not a mystical religion. An honest exploration of Buddhism is not about a rush to judgement which it often is for the beginner or dilettante. The beginner’s question of what is Zen cannot be straightaway answered; not because there is no answer to his question but the answer is beyond his capabilities to comprehend it. He is spiritually immature.

In my case, one of the first things that I learned when I begin my study of Zen during the early 1960s is the impossibility of understanding what Zen was pointing to, especially, in the example of koans. I also learned not to believe everything my teacher said to me like the time he told me he was the Tathagata or that emptiness is pregnant nothingness! As much as some Buddhist have a tendency to believe only what their teachers tell them, their teaching has to be understood relative to the Buddha’s discourses. These discourses are of great help in trying to get to first base in Buddhism. They have to be read carefully. There is a lot of nuance that goes into them. When I was a beginner I was not prepared for such subtlety. I would add to this and say that Buddhism, and especially Zen cannot be learned in a fortnight.

The first order of business for a raw beginner (I can remember this well) is just learning to be aware of your internal dialogue and emotions, not to mention learning to be aware of the immediate world around you. This takes a long time and serious commitment. The second order of business is learning to sit patiently still in a place far away from the human world. Sometimes I would sit by a waterfall, or beside a stream, or in an abandoned copper mine. Here, the trick is to make the physical body get in sync with the surrounding environment. Instead of it being always in sync with traffic noise, sirens, and the subtle energy of other humans near by, it is adapting to a new environment. This helps to get rid of the subtle tensions which block our ability to focus. The third order of business is to read what the Buddha taught carefully noting what you understand and what you don’t understand. As strange as this may sound, you have to be very honest about what you don’t understand. And why? Because you haven’t awakened to the absolute. You are is a state of profound ignorance.

If you are lucky, it will dawn on you that you must awaken to something quite profound that you’ve never been acquainted with before which transcends all your assumptions about what reality is. In my own example, it dawned upon me to awaken to pure Mind. I had become quite aware of what my impure monkey mind was. After all I had spent years being aware of my internal dialogue and my forever changing emotions. There was nothing pure or immaculate here! This brings us to the most difficult part: ceasing being a victim of samsara; attempting, for the first time, to leave it behind by seeing what is non-samsaric and transcends the monkey mind banging around in the skull between our ears.

While it is true that the Buddha was a founder of a new kind of Indian religion, in the popular definition of religion, the Buddha’s awakening and teaching is not based upon a belief in a creator type god or the same, a demiurge. The Buddha awoke to something quite profound and transcendent that he called Dharma. While this term has a number of additional meanings such as mental data, i.e., phenomena, and law, in regard to the Buddha’s awaking it meant ultimate reality or the absolute.

“The Dharma obtained by me is profound, of deep splendor, difficult to see, difficult to understand, incomprehensible, having the incomprehensible as its scope, fine, subtle, the sense of which can only be understood by the wise” (Catusparisat Sûtra).

The Buddha’s awakening allowed him to be able to teach gods (superhuman type beings) and men which tells us that his awakening transcended even the world of the gods. In this respect, also, the Buddha is a teacher (shastri), not a savior although his teaching is salvific. A Buddha points the way—he doesn’t carry us to Dharma. We must tread the path ourselves.

For the Buddha man’s salvation is to be found within, which today we might call the first-person or self which in Sanskrit is somewhat equivalent to âtman and in Pali, attâ. He said the self is dîpa which can mean an island, a shelter, refuge or nirvana. He said the self is also sarana which can mean refuge, protection, salvation and again nirvana. It is in and through the first-person that nirvana or liberation is achieved. It cannot be achieved outwardly, in the external world which, while seemingly real, from the standpoint of the wise is like a magic show and a dream; which is also conditioned and deceptive.

What makes our own salvation so difficult to achieve; which act as positive hindrances or nivarana are, according to the Buddha, the following:

Sensual desire (kamacchanda)

Ill-will (byapada)

Sloth and torpor (thina-middha)

Restlessness and remorse (uddhacca-kukkucca)

Skeptical doubt (vicikiccha)

All of these hindrances dominate the average person more or less which is why no real forward progress is ever made toward the eventuality of understanding what, exactly, the Dharma of the Buddha is. In Western Buddhism sensual desire and, especially, skeptical doubt dominate when the subject of reincarnation is brought up.

There is always the ever present tendency to revise Buddhism in an attempt to make it into something we are already familiar with which assumes that we have nothing much to learn and nothing undesirable to get rid of.

When can only learn what the Buddha taught when we have a more accurate picture of his awakening under the Enlightenment-tree whereby, as the Bodhisattva, he earned the name, Buddha.

September 22, 2013

It is âtman or the first-person that is liberated from samsara by attaining nirvana. We can also say it is the liberation of the first-person from the realm of conditionality who, all along, was unconditioned but had no way of confirming and realizing this until nirvana. Lacking nirvana. the first-person was only acquainted with suffering, in particular the psychophysical body. This is the world of samsara which is the cycle of repeated birth and death.

But anâtman, or what is not the first-person, is also useful since it serves in the liberation of the first-person. It reveals what is not the first-person including what I am to abandon and not desire. The process is sort of a Buddhist via negativa. Adding to this, it is much easier to know what I am not than what I am. Where the confusion arises most, is separating the first-person from the psychophysical constituents (skandha), namely, physical shape, feeling, perception, habitual tendencies, and consciousness, the last being the most subtle of all constituents.

Often we read that the Buddha teaches his followers that the five skandhas or psychophysical constituents, are not the first-person or not the âtman which is anâtman. He might say, citing an example from the Pali canon (S. iii. 23), "What is nonself [anâtman] should be seen as it really is with correct wisdom thus: 'This is not mine, this I am not, this is not my self.'" Here, we get the sense of breaking away from our former wrong identification with the five skandhas.

As a result of this breaking away, we are becoming more of who we really are and less of who we are not. There is also less of an inversion of perception (saññâya vipariyesâ). We are no longer just perceiving permanence, happiness, selfhood, and beauty in what is actually impermanent, suffering, not the self, and foul (A. ii. 52). This is about the salvation of the first-person.

September 18, 2013

Q: I am relatively new to Buddhism. I think I have been studying it for a year or more reading as many Sutras as I can. One thing surprises me about Buddhism on the Internet are the various forums. You’d think Buddhism was a bunch of different Buddhisms. I have been arguing with someone about Stephen Batchelor’s Buddhism which I think is materialism. I don’t see how that is Buddhism, but this guy claims it is. I know your interest in Batchelor and materialism creeping into Buddhism. What do you do in situations like this?

A: Forums and those who run them are sectarian—cross the line and you’re out. From a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being the most sectarian, these forum rate about 7 to 8. Their sectarian bent is towards a materialist interpretation of Buddhism. Face to face they will deny it. They will try to turn the tables. But when compared with The Zennist they hardly touch on the esoteric. There is really no conversation going on that could be considered edifying—and certainly nothing to do with exploring Buddhist ideas such as the place of the five skandhas and the self. The flavor is not at all academic, in other words. Thinking minds are not allowed. My advice? You can’t reason with them.

Q: I can see why you decided to do a blog. Do you think blogging is a better idea than starting a Buddhist chat room (I was thinking about it)?

A: Blogging is not easy. You have to be committed and do a heck of a lot of reading and thinking. In my case, I wanted to share my spiritual experiences and let people know that real Buddhism is alive and well—and you too can do it. The mystical experiences that I went through were amazing, simply amazing. I still get excited reading the sermons of a Zen master. Just to know that there were others like you is a joy. I want everyone to have these experiences—and work hard at trying to accomplish this. Unfortunately, the beginner has to do it the hard way. I can’t do it.

Q: What do you mean by the hard way?

A: The hard way is really enjoying and being captivated by Buddhism. Being also a detective working night and day trying to solve the world’s greatest mystery. You have to give it your all. The easy—and of course the unfruitful way—is just to sit in zazen and expect your teacher to make you a hundred year old sage. It ain’t gonna happen. Let me tell you about this guy who studied with me for a year. His name was Tony. I can’t remember the religion he was into before he met me, but he told me they had this sacred book that only the elect could see which had all the secrets in it. So what did Tony do?. He broke into the temple one night, got the book, copied it, and put it back into the temple. Sweet! Now that is the kind of enthusiasm and ingenuity it takes to understand Buddhism.

Q: Wow! Yes, I can see that it also requires a special kind of interest and courage. I think I suffer a lot from the romantic delusion that there are these old Zen masters in China living in caves who are Buddhas . I just need to learn Chinese and go there. I really want to do it. Is that wrong?

A: Yes and no. It is somewhat like looking for gold knowing nothing about it—never having even seen it. Yeah, its in California. Yeah, you are enthusiastic to start digging, but so what? But you first have to get a proper ‘gold education’ and the right tools. Then you can go.

Q: So who are all these people on the Buddhist forums?

A: Half are nerds, I suspect, who have really bad social skills; who suffer from the delusion that Buddhism can be understood by nerd intelligence. The other half are non-nerds who believe they might learn Buddhism, then eventually realize the nerdiness of the forum and leave for the own mental health. You can see why these types like Stephen Batchelor who is a Brit nerd. His wife, too, is a nerd—a French nerd.

Q: Were you ever a nerd?

A: In high school I went out with the “A” cheerleader Shirley several times. The Homecoming Queen had a crush on me. I was thought to have “bedroom eyes.” I had lots of friends. I was a maverick—not a nerd. In those days our nerds were called dorks. To not be a nerd only required of a guy to be athletic. Our high school, in the early 1960s, was one of the most advanced in maintaining a high degree of physical fitness. Our coach (Chicago Bears 1935) made us lift weights, do push ups—you name it. If a nerd could handle that everyday, they lost their dorkiness. The were at least muscular nerds that we could respect. When I started Zen, I had no problem doing zazen for hours. I was tough. But what really helped me is I wanted to know the secret of Zen that, seemed to me, to be hidden in koans. Zazen was too easy and boring. I loved koans and the fact that they said to me, “Dude, you ain’t gonna figure me out.” Zen is very positive and only for healthy, happy people. Unfortunately, it has become something like an out patient clinic for depressed people run by nerds. Yes, maybe you should go to China or South Korea which I hear is great. You might get lucky and meet that one Buddhist as I did, who will give you, so to speak, the map to the gold fields.

Q: Are you suggesting that Zen is dead in the U.S.?

A: Maybe some of it is. I would say the Soto type of Zen that stresses zazen is all but dead. To the extent that Zen does not emphasize realizing our true nature, which is pure Mind, it is dying. Consider all the Zen literature that speaks about Mind, in some form or other, it is quite astonishing to go into a Zen temple and hear nothing about it.

The future means “about to be” or "that is to be.” What we hope to be lies in the future which is being willed out. What appears now, is the result of this willing process. The present just didn’t come out of the blue, in other words. The present, according to the Buddha, is fabricated, willed, and dependently originated. Even our psychophysical body, i.e., the Five Aggregates, is previously composed and willed out.

In some mysterious way, to exist in the present, mind has already willed this. By the same token, if mind fully realized itself being thus pure Mind shorn of all adventitious defilements, it would always be this and never other, this would be from perfect willing as opposed to imperfect willing becoming always other than itself and unfulfilled.

Making a jump here, over time including may lifetimes, we have the capacity to will ourselves into any state of being including Buddhahood, provided, in the case of Buddhahood, we are able to crystalize pure Mind. After that, so to speak, Mind re-wills itself which is samadhi. The growth of itself is also the growth of its power over imperfection. This pure willing of itself is also compassion (karuna) which influences all beings. The world becomes, over time, illuminated instead of dark.

The future is not a meaningless term. Mind continually wills the future, in particular, what is about to be. The world that has come to be, which has been previously composed and willed out is also the world of former karma (pauranam karma). Karma, as doing or action, in one sense, implies mind not yet in complete harmony (samadhi) with itself. In harmony, it is Buddha Mind.

“The world fares on by karma. Mankind fares on by karma. Karma binds beings, as a linchpin the quickly moving chariot” (Sutta-Nipâta 654).

Making another jump, for mind to awaken to itself, thus becoming pure Mind which as come to be, involves willing/conceiving pure Mind adequately. This is where the effectiveness of koans and the study of Sutras are of great value. They limit and yet direct what can be willed/conceived. Only a perfect intuition of Mind is permitted, in other words.

September 17, 2013

Of the dicta of materialism perhaps one of the most important dictum is that the psychical can be reduced to material occurrences/motions in brain tissue which originate from molecular processes (following a reductionist line). The implication of this is that after death consciousness or mind is terminated since it arises from the brain, and the brain is no more.

But this is quite unreasonable if not completely absurd because in principle the materialist dictum is asserting that "where states x are correlated with dissimilars y; when y is no more, x is also no more.” This, however, is a false conclusion. It is like saying music is correlated with a radio. When the radio is accidentally broken, there is no more music (even though the radio signal with the music is still present despite the broken radio). The fact is that correlation between music and radio is not the same as identity. In the same vein, with a flat-lined electro-encephalogram (EEG) of the brain, consciousness is still present. This has been confirmed by Dr. Pim van Lommel in a publication of his in The Lancet, December 2001, entitled: “Near-death experience in survivors of cardiac arrest; a prospective study in the Netherlands.”

If, as materialists claim, brain tissue is the ‘maker’ of consciousness, how is it being made when there is no EEG present? Using our previous radio analogy, how is a radio which has been turned off or accidentally broken, which is believed to be the maker of music, making music? The simple answer, it is not. But we all know that a radio signal exists, although we can’t see it. And if the radio is turned back on, the music resumes.

Bringing this matter up in The Zennist blog, is meant to drive home the point that Buddhists who do not accept the Buddha’s teaching of rebirth by way of consciousness (viññâna/vijñâna) are in wrong view and need to recant.

The careful research of Wijesekera published in the Journal of the American Oriental Society 84/3 (1964): 256, entitled,”The Concept of Viññâna in Theravada Buddhism,” says:

“In view of such evidence the conclusion is difficult to avoid that the term viññâna in Early Buddhism indicated the surviving factor of an individual which by re-entering womb after womb (gabbhâ gabbham: Sn. 278, cp. D.iii.147) produced repeated births resulting in what is generally know as Samsara.”

It should also be noted that in the Maharatnakuta Sutra (C.C. Chang, A Treasury of Mahayana Sutras) there are several passages like these where the Buddha says:

"Just as a silkworm makes a cocoon in which to wrap itself and then leaves the cocoon behind, so consciousness produces a body to envelop itself and then leaves that body to undergo other karmic results in a new body” (230).

“When the consciousness leaves the body, it carries all the body’s attributes with it. It assumes an [ethereal] form as its body; it has no body of flesh and bones. Because it has the senses, it has feeling and subtle memory and can tell good from evil” (230).

A sincere Buddhist should not reject this nor adhere to a materialistic belief such as consciousness is a product of the brain (this is not science—it’s materialism). To do so is to attack Buddhism itself, in effect, turning Buddhism into a materialistic religion, a philosophical position that has been sufficiently refuted except for those, who without success, are still trying to resurrect this absurdity. In fact, it is more likely the case that matter doesn’t exist.

German theoretical physicist Werner Heisenberg said: “The ontology of materialism rested upon the illusion that the kind of existence, the direct 'actuality' of the world around us, can be extrapolated into the atomic range. This extrapolation is impossible, however.” Mathematician John von Neuman went so far as to assert that the only privileged position is when observation passes from the material brain to the observing mind, which implies a distinction between the two. This leads us to Donald Hoffman's new theory of “conscious realism” which I touched on before in The Zennist (September 1, 2013) that “consciousness creates brain activity, and indeed creates all objects and properties of the physical world.”